‘Digital health is a marriage of medical entrepreneurs and tech superstars’
Time and again we are reminded that healthcare is a fundamental right for every human, and despite several efforts being made on part of the public and private healthcare systems, there’s a remarkable number of people still deprived of this basic human need.
Over the course of the past few years a number of facilities have been brought directly to your doorsteps and much easier with real-time booking such as beauty services, cab services and many, but now for the first time healthcare has been made easier and much more widely accessible with an app that allows online immediate consultation from a doctor, booking an appointment in real time and many more. This app is known as myZindagi, a Lahore based startup that aims to bridge the gap between healthcare and the patients efficiently and easily.
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The website and mobile application has an easy use interface with the home page showing a search bar which has an option to select the city you are in, followed by a place to enter specialty, doctor, and symptom. It allows free video consultation, online appointment in real time or appointments can be made by call, free doctor advice via FAQ and video call, has a comprehensive health blog, medicines and lab results can be delivery to your doorsteps in 30 minutes and medical records are saved online. The video consultation treats conditions such as skin, sick child, female health, cold and flu, labs review, diabetes, sore throat, anxiety, stomach and male health. According to a review on ProPakistani.pk myZindagi has 16000 doctors on staff, 2500+ hospitals and caters to patients in over 40 cities in Pakistan. What makes this platform different from others that we had find on Google Search is the fact that this is especially for Pakistanis and the queries in the FAQs section are answered immediately by doctors who practice in Pakistan. This ensures that they are aware of availability of medicines, the condition of the city, the location of the closest hospitals etc. Since they are aware of most circumstances and can understand problems people face here their advice is more accurate and helpful.
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The cons of using this service are very few: live consultation is only available for in house doctors and myZindagi has a team of experienced doctors, generally general/family physicians, who are available from 9:00 am to 8:00pm. Unlike Ring A Doctor, myZindagi does not provide healthcare around the clock. However, with even these cons this is still better than what the government sector provides and Pakistan is one of the few countries where the expenditure in the private medical sector is more than the government one. Considering this and the fact with cheap 4G/3G phones available and used by about 35 million people by October 2016 out of those who have phones this initiative will help a number of people across the country and is indeed a very useful service.
Image source: MyZindagi
